[07e03] Interrupted... by MURDER
- Bram was called into the room. He jumped up on a table, tankard in hand. “Beggin’ your pardon, but… I don’t need to go in that room to make an offer. Listen up, me hearties. If I end up with that juice, then you (points to Stormcloud) get on my boat. You (points to Sartus and Tybalt), I’ll fix your Tree. You (points to Invictus) can’t use it anyway; and I’ll get your book back for ya. You (points to the SPI), I’ll tell you what happened to the rest of the SPI, and who was responsible. You (points to Orbach): you can be a pirate on my pirate ship; I know you want to. And you (pointing to Tremere): you get nothing; fuck you. And now: I gotta go take a shit. Think about it.” And he stomps out of the parlor into the foyer.
- Next, Stormcloud called Janus Ilaris. Tybalt channeled Janus. Tybalt hung like a marionette, floating/hanging with toes off the ground, with dead eyes, hair standing on end. Janus was translucent, wearing elven finery, floating an inch off the ground.
- Meanwhile, Cal sneaked out of the room after Tremere and Invictus, who had slunk off to have a private chat. He listened at the door of (what he later learned is) the “Preservatory.”
- Tremere: “What will it take to get you off my back?”
- Invictus: “I want your warforged.”
- Tremere pauses. “No deal.”
- Invictus (surprised/intrigued): “The pirate was right: you don’t have it anymore!”
- Tremere (angrily): “Of course I still have it!”
- Invictus, no longer interested. “We have nothing left to discuss.”
- And Cal heard Tremere’s stomping feet coming toward the door.
- Cal hid in the shadow of a foyer staircase, but Tremere noticed him—”What are you looking at?”
- Tremere stomped back to the parlor, trying but physically failing to break a decorative lamp.
- Tybalt, still as Janus, emerged. Stormcloud seemed more pleased with how the meeting went.
- Stormcloud called the SPI. They wrangled Vondal from the library. Cal followed the ghost into the dining area, where he discovered Tybalt having a private conversation with it. “Begone, mortal!” the ghost spoke in a deep supernatural voice, gestured dramatically and psionically pushed Cal out of the room.
- Afterward, back to normal, Tybalt apologized for his patron’s rudeness. “If you want to compare notes after your meeting, seek me out. Good luck.”
- Callie, Vondal and Cal entered the study with Stormcloud. “You have the best leverage. If you turn over both artifacts to me, I will give you the vial.” Both artifacts? Stormcloud revealed that the pommel of Cal’s sword is in fact the Arkenstone, the artifact of Light. Vondal and Cal realized that the timelines match up for when the stone disappeared, and when Hyperion (Cal’s guardian?) gave it to Cal. (Cal realized that Hyperion used the Giant word “instrument” when describing the sword, which at the time Cal had thought was merely a formalism of the situation, but he has now understood to mean something like “cardinal tool”).
- The party negotiated with Stormcloud. They offered to give her the Lamp, and let her study Cal’s stone between missions, with Cal’s supervision.
- While Stormcloud considered the offer, Callie asked to speak with her privately.
- Cal and Vondal left the room, seeing that only Timor Invictus was currently in the study, standing motionless in one corner.
- Meanwhile, Callie asked Stormcloud whether she knew anything about a puzzlebox. “You speak of the artifact of Knowledge, yes? The owner is in attendance at this auction.”
- Before Callie could ask anything further, a wave (of unmagic? or Flux?) washed over the room. Cal and Vondal could feel that the wave did not originate from the study, but rather the opposite direction from them.
- The lights went out; the room was lit by glowing green flames of a flameskull near the study ceiling. Stormcloud sprang into action, calling out: “Take them down! But please avoid collateral damage.”
- The SPI battled the flameskulls:
- The skulls moved quickly, shooting fire rays from their eyes, burning Callie and Vondal badly.
- Stormcloud then used mass protection from energy to give fire resistance to the agents.
- Cal stabbed one with an expert strike of his sun blade, and a wave of energy exploded outward from the pommel, damaging two enemies.
- Callie channeled her goddesses into an undead turning effect which destroyed the flameskull Cal had weakened most, and sent the other two fleeing into a corner of the parlor.
- Vondal hammered the two remaining skulls with scorching rays (crit!), before realizing that they were immune to fire-based attacks. However, he could feel that the matrix of his magic was, incredibly, completely aligned in a manner that made his attacks completely reliable, and more effective than usual.
- The skulls continued to flee, since they had not taken any damage.
- Stormcloud readied a counterspell, cautioning the agents to finish off the monsters quickly.
- Cal could not reach them, but pulled out his whip and hit one, which snapped it out of its panic to flee.
- Callie summoned a spiritual weapon, and blasted the damaged skull with sacred flame.
- Vondal hit the two skulls with an augmented witchbolt, which was again super effective, destroying one and damaging the other.
- The remaining skull tried to manifest a fireball in its mouth, but Stormcloud countered it with a chopping motion. She then readied another counterspell, saying, “I can only do that once more! Finish it quickly!”
- The agents slung more attacks at it. The skull tried to manifest a flaming sphere but it was again countered. Finally, Cal destroyed it with a final blow.
- They looked around warily, but saw no more foes.
- Soon after the battle, the lights flickered and the room returned to normal.
- A loud knock was heard in the distance, which Vondal recognized as the spell of that name being used somewhere nearby.
- Less than a minute later, Timor Invictus reappeared in the parlor. “I’m afraid I have bad news. Someone has died. I suggest you come quickly.”